As I trailed my way back to Lumiose – and was actually pretty close now –, remembering the day I left became easier, and my decision to cut all ties with Professor Sycamore was reaffirmed by memory's effective validation: I felt the same feelings from that day assault my breast and compromise my heartbeats with the sickness only memory can bring. How to face him after such a supreme level of intimacy? How to censor and escape his flirtation, after allowing him so far? How to pretend I didn't care so much - So much!? ...But, still, that was the best-case scenario. A fear of worse things crept silently up the back of my mind during that day, I eventually reminded myself of it: what if there were no longer his treacherous fingers pursuing, binding, handling me so lightly? No more of his special smiles and ambushes, after having achieved that which he craved like a beast? ...How would I be able to face him again then?! How would I bear it? To be... ordinary in his eyes…
There was also a small chance he would decide to listen to Lysandre: Staying away from me for my own good, or the good of the research, as they discussed, would seem much easier after achieving that troublesome goal. How cruel my thoughts were as they swirled around all those hypotheses; how truly trapped I was, between fearing the chains he skillfully tied around my ankles, and fearing the complete removal of those very same chains - to be put adrift, an anchorless sail through the empty vast of oblivion! But those were the scared feelings that haunted me then; now they seemed silly and exaggerated, specially under the discovery of Sycamore having put the entire Kalos on their watch for me. And, after all, wasn't this meeting towards which I moved probably just another one of his ambushes? Another excuse to get me away from the public eye so he could resume his sensory onslaught? I held back a smile as one tried to stretch across my face – the butterflies had returned as if they'd never gone away.
On the day I left Lumiose I walked until dusk, then stopped at a Pokémon Center to rest, let my party out of their pokéballs for some fresh air, and together we watched the night descend.
Charizard looked around with excited eyes once he was out, probably looking for the last person he had seen before going back to his ball – that had to be Sycamore, who retrieved him from the storage system. But Sycamore wasn't anywhere near, and Charizard's eyes eventually spotted me sitting on the bench, watching his reaction. His mood sank considerably with obvious disappointment: I wasn't the professor. I hadn't abandoned him back to his former master just because he disobeyed me in battle, as he might have initially assumed... and that didn't look like such good news to him.
"I guess some things just don't change, do they?" I sighed away my impatience – my spirit was so subdued, I couldn't even be mad – perhaps only just as disappointed as Charizard was with me. I caressed his long neck and tried to solace his sunken head... it was the least I could do, however annoyed his devotion made me feel: I suffered from the very same illness!
A leather bracelet held his mega stone in place around his ankle – certainly a gift from the professor, a proof that they had spent time together and an incentive for the two of us to fight on and reach that ultimate level of evolution. I complied with the undeclared intention, accepted it as my next goal; the gift was also more than convenient... But, for the first time, I didn't want to do it for him – for Professor Sycamore. I wanted to do it for Charizard… no, for myself, so I could be acknowledged as his master... so he would obey only me! That determination kept me away from both feeling angry at my Pokémon and missing Sycamore... Tossing my Pokédex so he couldn't track me anymore was just a collateral decision, and thus six weeks were past with me hardly looking inside – only ahead of myself, for the next gym and the next battle... It was a good feeling overall, but not one so easy to keep up all day without stressing myself: pushing thoughts of him away felt pretty much like holding a stretched rubber band – tiresome, but how hurtful it would feel to let it go after stretching it so far!
The elevator door beeped open – a sound familiar to all my associated memory. The room was involved in his pleasant scent like I didn't even remember it for being.
"You have come!" Sycamore pushed back his chair as soon as he spotted me on the door frame.
He got up from his desk, walked around it slowly then stopped before it, supporting his arm on the surface and facing me from a distance.
"I must say I am surprised!" He smiled, picking up from his desk what was probably my retrieved pokédex "That you should really be willing to relinquish this research, now that you are so close..." his eyes narrowed, he held the device between us, challenging me to truly forsake it. I must admit it was a tough decision to make...
"Close to what?" I sighed, and walked away from his scrutinizing eyes – the idea of leaving my feelings on display for his amusement made me annoyed.
"To unlocking your Pokémon's full potential, of course!" He chuckled, surrendering his torture and putting his hands in his pockets – pokédex included.
"I don't know what you're talking about..." I casually commented, pretending to be distracted examining the decoration of the room.
"Don't you, now? I figured you would..." He teased sarcastically "After all... You have earned yourself seven gym badges!"
My heart beat out of pace – briefly. I willed it into containment: should I be surprised that Sycamore knew all about me?
"And what's the big deal in that?!" I turned my back on him, walking to the window and looking through it "Isn't that what we're supposed to do, after all? Many have achieved it before me, and advanced much farther, too!"
"Indeed ..." he agreed, his voice moving from one point to the other "But your friends are wondering: why do they see your name carved in every gym they pass by, but never actually get to see you anymore? A ghost that is always inexplicably one step ahead, never stopping to justify its leaving... I am running out of things to say in your defense, darling..."
"Say nothing, then. Or tell them the truth, for all I care… I'm sure they'll understand." I sighed, my heart growing colder with an unpleasant sensation by remembering them. "…I'm just taking some time on my own."
"If you insist!" He moved calmly, walking towards me and stopping near, behind my back "But that is not all, is it?" I felt his fingers play with the tip of my hair – so lightly I wasn't sure whether it was my wary imagination or not "You have also gone and become a Duchess in the Battle Chateau, sending out invites challenging the toughest trainers they could find... didn't you?"
His voice grew softer, more involving, my imagination recreating more of the feeling of his touch – I had longed for it.
" You've defeated everyone on your way, from here to Anistair, also taking the time to chase off some Team Flare you found in between. You did a wonderful job since that day..." I heard him smile at last "…and now you truly wish to pull yourself from my research?" Here his voice subsided into almost a whisper, and I turned around to face him: His hand was held up, his fingers still positioned as they were when they held my hair in them.
"Have you been following me?" I asked, looking both at his hand and his eyes.
His smile stretched "No – I have not... but everyone else has!" And here the hand that waited on the air leaned closer, the back of his fingers brushed lightly, carefully framing my face. His other palm held the wall behind me.
"The news are all about some tough girl terrifying the most confident trainers with a Greninja so fast he nears invisibility; an angry-looking Charizard; a defensive Raichu and the others I can easily recognize as your team..." His eyes narrowed as if he himself had to process the information to make it believable "In reading about you, I am unsure whether you are just plainly teasing me, or pushing yourself to the very limit: It seems this mysterious trainer likes to ignore type matchups – her Raichu is known for stubbornly defeating ground-types, and all the others have been heard to resist super effective attacks and fight back without withdrawal... Tell me, dear: Are you purposely punishing them?!"
"I figured it would only make them stronger – to toughen up before their weaknesses!" I replied, falling into his gaze.
He smiled closer into me – his eyes inevitably surveying my lips every now and then.
"And so they have..." He sighed, distracted with brushing his thumb against my chin.
"Disappointed?!" I couldn't help but ask, as his sigh sounded a lot like it.
"Perhaps a little..." he admitted, to my surprise, and his voice tone trembled as it ripped through – again – tensed muscles. There it was: his concealed annoyance.
"Why?" I inquired, resisting the effect of his hands on me.
Sycamore stopped glaring into me with piercing eyes to enjoy a heartfelt, silly laugh. He then went on to explain, but his voice was no less unnerved:
"I must admit I have tricked myself, dear – or perhaps you have!" his hand let go of me to also press his palm to the wall behind me, cornering me and forming a cage. "You see, back in your mother's house I nourished the hope that, once here in Lumiose, under my wing, you would be just as much willing to give your journey a break as you were in Vaniville Town..."
My brow tensed...
"You... wanted me to quit?!"
"That is a rather extreme interpretation, of course... I merely..." His body leaned closer "fancied you'd stay inside with me for a little while..."
I felt the cold dissipate from my heart and crack its way to my bones, giving me chills.
"But instead – you escaped me completely! Without a word, too... Tell me, Anne, is that a way of treating such a thoughtful host as I made myself? What should I do with you now?!" Both his hands held the sides of my face, his thumbs pushing my head up and holding me in view. I twitched inside them.
"And should I have stayed with you?!" I gnarled, closing my eyes shut and punching his chest, struggling away "In your house?! In all your stupid secrecy?!!"
"Ah yes..." he laughed nervously, holding me tighter as I struggled "Wouldn't it be fun?! Hiding you would certainly be a necessity... So I would build you an elegant little cell and lock you inside my room! You could never leave it unless I allowed you to ..." He leaned down, leveling his eyes with mine and flashing his mean smile. "You would be my own dirty little secret..."
I pushed him away at last, intimidated by the obsessed, sarcastic form through which his anger leaked.
"A moment lost, dear! A moment lost..." he sighed, faking a tragic expression.
"You can be scarier than Lysandre sometimes, you know..." I murmured mostly to myself, adjusting my clothes.
"It is only your brave young eyes that tease me so – where have you ever found them, anyway? They challenge me saying you mustn't obey me! To go so far as to remove yourself from my tutorship? That's not the Anne I left behind... but someone entirely new, desperately trying to prove herself!"
And his eyes examined me by the end of those words, confirming his remark – they were strangely filled with annoyance, but also affection, and also some sort of sadness...
"Now you must flatter yourself with having achieved such confidence completely on your own, without consulting me or leaning on friends; growing more certain of your abilities through suffering and struggling with yourself alone, in detriment of your very own stressed nerves and every single relation around you! And have I not assured you of your worth a million times before? Have I not acknowledged your natural talent and scolded you for suspecting otherwise? ...But you could really not trust anyone's word but your own, could you? What a harsh, cruel judge you make! So now, at last, you have it! Only tell me: was it so worth it, dear? ...Cutting everyone out?!" he sighed and looked out the window over my head, musing and smiling silly to himself "Now allow yourself to imagine how happy this moment would be for me - how lucky, if you had listened! You would presently say 'Ah! My beloved Professor! I am a better person because you taught me to be so, and I am a great trainer because you guaranteed me I could!', and thus you would run into my arms like a devoted kitty, and I would lavish you with the warmest caresses!!"
His hand covered my face once more – the careful touch was there again, uncertain of its influence over me. "But instead you chose to leave me without a word, and then despise me like a tyrant! Do you not, Anne?! Despise me?!"
Sycamore held me in both his hands, pulling me closer. He rested his forehead against mine, and his eyes impatiently demanded an answer, invading mine and wrenching it out of me almost by force. I was scared of him then... scared of his passion, of his frayed movements, of his growing intensity... but I wasn't as insensitive as he judged: I could feel my eyes getting wet, moved by his torturous misinterpretation of my regard, moved by his hands holding me against him, like a captive he desperately needed to prevent from escaping for the sake of his own beating heart.
"Why won't you stay with me at last, Anne dear?!" he inquired, fastening his arms around me. I touched them... tried to move them with the little strength sadness allowed me to have…
"I can't..." I moaned, trying to pull away. He made me want to cry... my heart starting to beat fervently! I was in trouble if I remained... I was in troubled if he tried to investigate my feelings there...
"And why the deuce can't you?!" he inquired, his voice growing in intensity.
I started punching him away again, diving into my own little nervous fit. Tired of that, his arms picked me up and, mocking my powerlessness, he moved me across the room and placed me on top of his desk.
"Say it at once..." he held my face tightly against his hot chest, his hair fell over me as he looked down "Do you not like your dear Professor anymore?"
I could feel his sad smile, his conformed voice and his tight fingers unwilling to let go, and all the unnecessary drama weighing on me! Tears started to well up, at last! He started to pet my head repeatedly, forcing the feelings out now that he saw a glimpse of them.
"Do you not love me like you did before?" the bold question was given release, and all my fears confirmed. Could I resist it? Could I not say it? My hesitating, trembling arms gave out, and folded around his large torso.
"You do, do you not?!!" His voice picked up, inquiring imperatively "What reason had you then, and what right?!"
I put my arms around his neck and pulled him closer, hiding my face under his hair. Interpreting it as the ultimate invitation, he fell on top of me: his large body embraced and pressed mine against the desk, pushing me down, caring not about all the things that fell to the floor... I did love him! More than ever, and that was the reason, and that was the problem! I expected it would be over after I had slept with him... but the intimacy only made it worse: Now the single memory would put down all my defenses, needless of his touch teasing me. If I let it get too far – that far, as he suggested - he would be able to control my entire life with ease... and from what I knew of him, he was more than willing – more than capable of doing so, so little blessed with scruples as he was! It was a dangerous affair, and it got more dangerous by the hour...
My body arched violently as he abruptly put a hand inside my coat, between my legs.
I struggled against the almost painful invasion, and Sycamore's hand quickly held my face down on the table, effectively immobilizing me.
"Quiet now!" he ordered softly, moving on top of me in order to face me "Only answer me, my darling..." The fingers that pressed my cheeks moved across my skin, feeling the teardrop that rolled down my eye and brushing them away "Have I permitted this scene that night?" his voice shook "Have I wrung a single tear from your precious self?!"
I moved, trying to slip from under him: it was an ambush! He was mad!
"Was I not the most delicate lover, in spite of myself?! Then what reason had you..." His finger slid softly into me, wrenching a moan that he quickly muffled by capturing my mouth in his palm. Satisfied with how my body trembled under him, he pulled out his hand and moved it upwards, held the collar of my coat... pulled it to the side abruptly, forcing the buttons and half-opening it "...to leave like you did?!"
I moaned loudly, but that only caused his grip to tighten against my face, proving how little into listening he was.
"I should hurt you, dear..." his voice shook with a fearsome, yet still contained fury that made my eyes wide with terror. He laughed, I squirmed harder, trying to get away.
"A very adequate disciplinary measure, some defend!" He added to my torment in his most composed voice, little troubled by my best struggle. "...But yet..." He sighed, changing tones: mean entertainment was still there as he probed my terror, but so was something dark and sullen now... I felt his chest expand with a sigh, pinning me down. "...For some utterly unknown reason, I cannot!"
And his eyes stared down at me for too long, musing – so long that I saw something in them, too: Something quite similar to how I felt the day I left... something of... fear?!
I must have automatically grimaced as I looked into them, expressing my confusion, for he smiled, still holding my mouth in his palm:
"Ah yes... the thrill of a new threshold! The feelings I so envied in you, they are here, I feel them too! And how they torture me!" he stressed the word with a very sincere intensity of feeling "You have played me, dearest..." he sentenced, quite annoyed by the discovery "And I must not allow that!"
I was confused – Professor Sycamore was clearly hurt by my actions, I finally saw that... And how did such possibility never cross my mind before? But though I felt sorry for him, and hated myself for it... I was still in trouble: his hurt expression hinted an angry punisher much more than a dejected, heartbroken lover.
I tried to push him away, his shoulders weighed heavier, pinning me down.
"What is it? Could you be trying to resist me, dear?!" He paused, relaxing his eyebrows and smiling a meaner, challenging smile.
I mumbled into his hand, screaming as loud as I could, but very little of that sound escaped his grip – and the little that did only served to amuse him.
"I can't possibly understand you, dear…" he mocked "But then again, what good are your words? We have established you can be quite the skilled liar…"
His free hand surrounded my breast, squeezing it painfully... I moaned.
"No… I'll listen to this instead… It can't possibly lie, regardless of how you choose to hide from me! It shall fail me not…"
…And his hand moved down to my legs, touching me there again. I squeezed my eyes shut, tortured with vexation when he moaned with pleased surprise, then chuckled at my state.
"See?" his fingers caressed, teasing, humiliatingly… "I can't believe how wet you have become, despite all that fussing. But you are an obedient little thing deep down, are you not, my darling pupil? All hot and ready to receive your professor!"
I moaned and cried anew inside his hand, my voice unheard.
"You need only relinquish that silly pride of yours and given in to your urges… as I do." He smiled. I frowned and cursed, unheard. "No? Well then, I have a way of pitting your pride against you…"
Sycamore pulled his fingers from me abruptly, wrenching a muffled cry, then that same hand shuffled through my chest, pulling the sides of my coat away, then it pulled the collar of my shirt down, ripping it loose. The effort revealed my bra through the collar opening. With a mean laugh, Sycamore clipped it open, revealing my breasts completely.
"Now, this makes for a better view. Do you still wish to cry out, dear? To scream bloody murder and have all my assistants rush into this office?"
His smothering hand slowly, carefully started letting go of my mouth, testing how much noise I'd produce… I panted nervously as I watched his devious smile grow.
"I didn't think so…"
I moaned anew, losing air as his fingers invaded me again, playing, knowing exactly which buttons to push. All the while his eyes were fixed on mine, confidently expecting something – it must have come in the form of a specific cry, or an arched breath, or an expression I couldn't control, for his smile eventually stretched and satisfaction intensified the gleam in his mean gaze.
"Do you want me to scream now, dear? With that lewd voice, with your face all red? Are going to ask me to stop, too, when you clearly don't feel that way?"
I couldn't speak! Breathing became hard... my core heated up too quickly, experiencing that very unique intensity of feelings again. It felt scary all over again… terrifying, really, but I was helpless before the fall. My body ached, but not with pain… Sycamore smiled, pushing himself against me.
"Have I not treated you kindly?" he inquired, leaning down over me and pouring out his resentment in the form of almost rough caresses "Have I not taught your body well?"
He pulled my legs apart – I closed my eyes, expecting the feeling, the heat, the maddening sting of invasion...
"So well that even now it answers to me only, ignoring its master's mental will – your silly resolve to suddenly resist me?!" He whispered into my ear, teasing it with his warm breath and a soft bite. Any protests I tried to put together poured out in the form of muffled moaning.
Now sufficiently assured of my incapability of escaping or putting up any significant struggle, Sycamore relieved me of his weight – he was standing against me now as I was helplessly laid on his desk. He took his time lustfully observing my broken state from his height as a short smile gave out the obscene pleasure some unknown thoughts provided him, then, having anticipated enough, his hand grabbed my wrists together and pulled them above my head, securing them against the desk.
"You will find there won't be any pain, not unless I want there to be..." he composedly suggested, lifting an eyebrow "You won't experience any sensation other than the ones I want to give you." His free hand softly brushed the fingers against the inner part of my thigh "No nerve will respond with an electric current that isn't mine, or dare reproduce a feeling I haven't allowed – try your best, they will only obey me: I hope that will teach you a lesson."
And from his distance he gazed firmly – decidedly, meanly, irrefutably – on me. Picking up my leg by the back of the knee, he pulled me closer to the edge of the table, where his torso awaited, occupying the space between them.
"It's my wish that you won't close them this time: your eyes." he smiled "but you won't find such need, one way or the other: your inside is fully prepared now... adjusted to receive me!"
I blushed in embarrassment, breathing hardly.
"It is how the body works... let me show you..."
I felt him then – he moaned hard as he mercilessly pushed inside me – but he was right: my body dared giving no sign of pain, no resistance, no anger whatsoever that could remotely match my former frame of mind.
The desk shook – more and more the things on top of it fell to the floor, more and more I saw bitterness cloud Sycamore's face as his eyes locked against mine, immobilizing me...
My brain, if capable of processing any of the reprimands he still repeated to me through a strangled breath, was utterly helpless in memorizing any of it. My mind was too foggy, too consumed to listen, to heed his threats - even more helpless in understanding any of the French he used as he moaned foreign words, cussing me between his clenched teeth. His hand would occasionally still hold my mouth shut, and his arms would sometimes pull my legs closer against him and firmly hold them there in an attempt to reduce how much the desk rocked with his violent pushing, and how much noise I produced after each one – Despite losing control, Sycamore was clever enough to keep in mind, throughout the hot abuse he inflicted, that we were still inside his lab.